It’s Official: Legalization Measure Makes the Arizona Ballot

PHOENIX (AP) — A voter initiative to legalize recreational cannabis will be on the November ballot after the Arizona Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected a final legal challenge to the measure.

A lower court judge had thrown out the challenge, saying the group called Arizonans for Responsible Drug Policy didn’t have a right to sue.

Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Jo Lynn Gentry’s ruling went on to reject all of the reasons opponents laid out for keeping the initiative off the ballot.

The opponents said initiative backers used illegal and unconstitutional “bait-and-switch tactics” and that the initiative violates Arizona’s statutes in three ways. They include a misleading 100-word summary that leaves out important provisions, an “incoherent” text and title that obscures the extent of its impact on other laws, and a failure to provide a legal funding mechanism.

The high court sidestepped the right to sue argument, with Chief Justice Scott Bales calling Gentry’s reliance on a 2015 rewrite of a law “murky at best, and rather than wade into those waters, we turn to the merits.”

Bales went on to affirm Gentry’s ruling rejecting the merits of the opponents’ lawsuit, saying the summary substantially complied with the law’s requirements for initiatives.

The ruling means that Proposition 205 is on November’s general election ballot.

Under the measure, adults 21 and older could carry up to one ounce of marijuana and consume it privately. Adults could also cultivate up to six plants in an enclosed space and possess the cannabis produced by the plants. No more than a dozen plants would be allowed in a single residence.

The system would regulate cannabis in a way proponents say is similar to alcohol, with a 15 percent tax on all retail cannabis sales. Most of the new state revenue would go to Arizona public schools and education programs.

Barrett Marson, spokesman for the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol, said it was “a good day for voters who want to end marijuana prohibition in Arizona.”

“Voters will get the opportunity that they requested — more than 258,000 people signed a petition to put this before the voters,” Marson said. “The Supreme Court agreed voters should have the final say on whether adults should have the right to legally purchase marijuana.”

The Secretary of State confirmed that about 177,000 of those signatures were valid, more than the approximately 151,000 need to qualify for the ballot.

Arizonans for Responsible Drug Policy, which includes two prominent county attorneys and the Arizona Chamber of Commerce, said they will now turn to urging voters to reject the measure.

“Our goal now is to make sure that every Arizonan enters the voting booth in November with a full understanding of both the intended and the unintended impacts of the 20 pages of new laws in Prop 205,” Yavapai County Attorney Sheila Polk said in a statement. “We hope all citizens will read the lengthy legalese before voting and will learn how devastating Proposition 205 would be to our state if passed.”

Opponents say backers have not told voters about changes to DUI laws, child custody issues, employment law and many other laws.

In another development Wednesday, a Maricopa County judge ordered one change to the ballot description voters will see but rejected other revisions sought by the backers.

Judge James Blomo agreed with the measure’s backers that the description crafted by Secretary of State Michele Reagan wrongly said cannabis will be legal for people over 21, when it should be 21 and older, and ordered it changed.

Blomo rejected efforts to insert language showing that a 15 percent marijuana tax would mainly funds schools and enforcement efforts and another minor change. Blomo said omitting the descriptions aren’t misleading and Reagan has the discretion to leave them off.

Yep, the world as we know it fell into disarray and chaos when it was legalized in Colorado.. oops, wait scratch that… it happened when it was legalized in Washington. What, it didn’t? Oh, okay, it must have happened when it was legalized in Oregon then, right? No…?!!? Hmm.. okay, it surely must have happened when it was legalized in Alaska and D.C., correct? *sigh* Well, we know for a fact the world will end when it becomes legal in Arizona…right?… right???

Jah LoveIrit

Devastating how?? Taking it away from minors? Providing a source of additional funds for the State? Shutting down the black market? Oh yeah… all very devastating. SMH. These naysayers need to go. They’re still living in reefer madness time.

Robert Gerus

About fucking time should be legal all over the world, if god didn’t want mankind to have this wonder plant he wouldn’t grow it, but there are a lot of greedy governments and people in the planet of our’s that love turning profit out of sorrow and putting folks in prisons for nothing and stealing all their shit. Legalize it dammit….

Jim Beam

…..these neanderthals insist on maintaining laws that bloat and drain their systems when so many other pressing issues need those economic resources–where’s the logic (not to mention the will of the people) ?

pdqBach

Most of this law seems pretty good. Up to 2 adults per household can have 6 plants each at a time and be able to keep everything that they grow,
Where it starts getting a bit sketchy is where it talks about a new “marijuana enforcement agency” that has the ability to change the rules and then enforce them seemingly without the burden of due process. So this dream legislation has a nightmarish turn in it. Is this really a good step towards ending the prohibition in Arizona, or is it just another step in maintaining the grip that the current cartel of dispensary owners have on controlling a medicine that rightfully belongs in the hands of the people of this state.